Kristie J’s review of Commodity (Unexpected Circumstances, Book 1) by Shay Savage
Dystopian Romance published by Amazon Digital Services 18 Oct 15
I did a review not long ago that had quite a number of excellent reviews that I gave low marks to and said that often this happens. A book that others enjoyed didn’t fare nearly as well with me. Well, this is an example of the opposite. Once I finished it, I went looking at other reviews and a number of readers didn’t like this one. On the other hand, I quite enjoyed it. It takes a great deal of suspension of belief and if abuse of women is a hot button, best to avoid it. But I was able to suspend belief and keep in mind this is fiction and not real, so it worked quite well. A couple of years ago I read Transcendence by the same author and that book blew me out of the water with its impact. Though this one doesn’t have quite the same impact, still I liked it more than some.
Our heroine Hannah is flying to Washington, DC to testify against the leader of a white slavery ring. This is a very powerful person with contacts in very high places, so she is to be protected, starting when she lands in Atlanta for a transfer. But their flight is delayed and before she catches the next plane, life on earth as she knows it is over. Falk, her main protector, and Hannah are walking through the airport when a series of bomb blasts begin, coming from all over. He rushes her down to the subway, down to the deepest part until the bombing has stopped. Once they emerge, it’s like they’ve walked into hell. Most of the city seems to be flattened and the ground is littered with dead bodies. But, oddly, all the bodies are men. There seem to be no women or children in sight. It seems as if they are the only two people who survived.
They make their way to Falk’s place, which is still standing, and load up on supplies they think they might need. They also need to take time to help Hannah, who suffered a pretty bad wound to her leg. They aren’t quite sure what to do as this is now a world they don’t know. During their wanderings, they come across others who have survived this apocalyptic event and begin to band together. But it doesn’t take long for the completely unbalanced ratio of men to women to become an issue and after a series of events, Falk and Hannah are forced to strike out on their own, only once again Hannah is captured by the same evil forces that had held her in captivity before the world changed. Falk is devastated as the feelings he had felt for her right from the beginning had only grown stronger. Can he rescue her from a fate worse than death?
This is a very fast-paced adventure. I had trouble putting it down because I always wanted to know what was going to happen next. I quite like Falk. He reminds me of Kevin Costner in The Bodyguard. He is determined to be calm and collected and has admired Hannah right from the beginning for her bravery in surviving being captured, held captive, and raped by the slavery ring when she blew the whistle on them. He’s very alpha and his only mission is to make sure he keeps her safe at any cost. Once their world changes, he lets down the barrier of professionalism and lets her know of his attraction.
Hannah, on the other hand, is a bit more problematic for me. I like her, but she has a few TSTL moments when she doesn’t listen to Falk and she manages to land into trouble. I put it down to naiveté and too trusting in this new reality they live in, but when it happened more than once, well, I was wishing she listened to him.
Though there is rape in this book and I know this will be a turn-off for many, it’s not explicit, more implied. So while I would normally recommend this one without reservations, this one needs a warning for any reader with hot buttons.
Grade: B-
Summary:
Hannah, A woman hunted by human traffickers.
Falk, A hot and dangerous bodyguard.
Utter destruction.
The end of civilization.
The beginning of a new form of currency.
Women are now the highest COMMODITY.
No excerpt available.
Other books in this series:
